The descendants sat on bales of straw in a wide circle around a late afternoon fire as the sun dropped into the pine forest at the Maidu Active Cultural Center just outside Nevada City. Offerings of tobacco were tossed into the fire by each participant.>>>

To understand the culture of the Shuar people of Ecuador, it is crucial to appreciate the importance they place on “the hidden world.”

As the American academic and white shaman Michael Harner explains in his book The Jivaro: People of the Sacred Waterfalls the Shuar believe that waking life is simply “a lie,” or illusion, while the true forces that determine daily events are supernatural. The Shuar believe that witchcraft is the cause of the vast majority of illnesses and non-violent deaths. This view of reality has created a demand for numerous Shuar shamans, people who are able to interpret the forces of the “real” world and help others interpret and deal with these supernatural elements.>>>

Ethnobotanists, people who study the relationship between plants and people, have long documented the extensive use of medicinal plants by indigenous shamans in places around the world, including the Amazon. But few have reported on the actual process by which traditional healers diagnose and treat disease. >>>

It's what that something is that's up for debate. Either:# The world will end.# A new age of harmony will begin, or,# Panic will ensue as men around the world wake up to realize there are only four shopping days left until Christmas.In any event, we have another much-publicized doomsday deadline fast approaching and filmmakers and book publishers know it. According to the Mayan calendar — which can't be purchased at your local Hallmark store because it hasn't been used since the 1500s>>>